Washington, D.C., sometimes better known for political gridlock, ranked as the worst city for traffic congestion in 2010.
If you commute every day in the nation’s capital, you were stuck in traffic for about 74 hours last year – enough time for about 25 expense-account lunches. The delays added up to an additional $1,495 in fuel costs per auto commuter.
So why is the traffic in Washington so bad?
“Too many people,” replies John Townsend, a spokesman for AAA Mid-Atlantic.
The Washington metro area, he says, has been growing and prospering even while other parts of the United States went into recession. Now, some 1.7 million people drive to work every day on roads that were not built for that many cars.
“There is not one highway without a bottleneck,” says Mr. Townsend, noting that the beltway and I-95, the main north-south road, can be bumper to bumper during rush hour.
It will only get worse, he says, as a result of the Pentagon’s base realignment, which will add thousands of commuters to the region once the military gets through closing other facilities. For example, Andrews Air Force Base will get 6,000 new jobs, Fort Meade will add 7,000, and Fort Belvoir will grow by 19,000 jobs.
The region is adding high-occupancy toll lanes for cars carrying three or more people. And Washington itself is taking up 70 road construction projects. However, Townsend says, that will not be enough. “You cannot build enough roads to build your way out of the problem,” he says.
